The United Kingdom
Notes
Transcript
Call to Worship:
Bless - what does it mean?
God has blessed me.
Bless God, the psalms often say. Or, the songs we sing!
God blesses - with provision, with presence, with redemption of wrongs/mistakes, with ??
to bless God in return - to declare our trust & hope, our dependence on God, to thank and praise God for who God is - which is most clearly revealed to us in the person of Jesus, but we see God’s attritibutes all through the OT as well. And David’s Psalms are full of “blessing God” baruch - and act of adoration, indicates kneeling (humility)
Let’s review…
Where are we in the story?
Creation & Fall
Humans are made to live in the presence of God and in relationship with one another and with all of creation.
Family of Faith
Get outside! Look up! A promise made to a childless couple to not only “bless them” but to bless the entire world through their family.
Exodus & Call
Moses leads the Israelites (look at how Abraham & Sarah’s family has grown!) out of Egypt, out of slavery, and into the wilderness where they will wander for 40 years. Moses dies and Joshua leads the tribes of Israel into Canaan.
Tribes & Judges
This is really different than wandering in the desert:
their dependence on God is not as obvious or necessary (direction/guidance and daily manna)
God responds with Judges to help them navigate the messiness of life in Canaan. Someone to help discern right from wrong, someone to settle disputes, etc.
they long to be like the other nations… they want a king. And so all through the book of Judges, God keeps saying, “I’m your king. You’re not like the other nations. Stop trying to be like them.
This period of Judges is dark… with each generation more disobedient than the last. And so, God seems to relent and decides to give them a king.
The United Kingdom
Last week we heard Hannah’s story of longing for a child- which comes just at the end of this period with the birth of Samuel who will be the one to anoint the both Saul & David
Setting the scene:
Saul - Samuel anoints Saul (transition from Judges to Kings)
Doesn’t go well and God sends Samuel to Jesse’s house to anoint the next king (while Saul is still in power)
David - Samuel looks on the heart and settles on David… “a man after God’s own heart” is the description given when Samuel is seeking someone who isn’t like Saul.
what do we know about David? (because this is our one moment to consider him, even though you could do a whole series just about the life of David…
-youngest of Jesse’s 8 sons
-from Bethlehem
-shepherd of his Dad’s sheep - a job in which he showed courage & faithfulness by killing both a lion and a bear that attacked the flock
-musical - played the harp
-defeated Goliath when Saul’s army (3 of David’s brothers were in the army - Jesse sent David to check on them!)
-best friends with Saul’s son Jonathan (awkward!)
-Saul tried to kill him, David had opportunity to kill Saul and didn’t
-David becomes king of all the people of Israel - all the tribes united - hence our title UNITED KINGDOM
Immediately establishes a capital - Jerusalem and builds himself a Palace.
Moves the Ark of the Covenant (which signifies the presence of God) to Jerusalem. In a Tabernacle pitched now in Jerusalem. (And there’s a story of David dancing naked to celebrate the arrival of the Ark… his wife is embarrassed by him. And, well, I get it!)
-not without his struggles or his giant mistakes… Bathsheba & Uriah
sexual assault & murder
One more important person in David’s life… Nathan
a prophet - a special advisor to the King
We’ll meet more prophets as we keep going… and there are at least two kinds of prophet: central and peripheral.
Central prophets are “on the king’s payroll” and so, while they are expected to speak the truth, and they do, they do so from within the system, located IN the centre of things.
Peripheral prophets will speak from the margins, and speak truth to power from the margins.
Today, we pick up right after David has established Jerusalem as his capital and as the location of worship by moving the Ark.
We will read the first half of the chapter.
Reading: 2 Samuel 7:1-7
1 It happened that the king settled in his house. (Now Yahweh had given rest to him from all his enemies all around.) 2 And the king said to Nathan the prophet, “Look, please, I am living in a house of cedar, but the ark of God is staying in the middle of the tent.” 3 Nathan said to the king, “Go and do all that is in your heart, for Yahweh is with you.” 4 But it happened that night, the word of Yahweh came to Nathan, saying, 5 “Go and tell my servant David, ‘Thus says Yahweh: “Are you the one to build for me a house for my dwelling? 6 For I have not dwelt in a house from the day I brought up the Israelites from Egypt until this day; rather, I was going about in a tent and in a tabernacle. 7 In all of my going about among all the Israelites, did I speak a word with one of the tribes of Israel whom I commanded to shepherd my people Israel, saying, ‘Why did you not build me a cedar house?’ ” ’
2 Samuel 7:8–11 (LEB)
8 So then, thus you shall say to my servant David, ‘Thus says Yahweh of hosts, “I took you from the pasture from following the sheep to be a leader over my people, over Israel, 9 and I have been with you everywhere you went. I have cut off all of your enemies from in front of you, and I will make a great name for you, as the name of the great ones who are on the earth. 10 I will make a place for my people Israel, and I will plant them so that they can dwell in their own place. They will not tremble any longer, and the children of wickedness will not afflict them again, as in the former days. 11 In the manner that I appointed judges over my people Israel, I will give you rest from all your enemies.
2 Samuel 7:11–16 (LEB)
And Yahweh declares to you that Yahweh will build a house for you. 12 When your days are full and you lie down with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you who will go out from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. 13 He will build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. 14 I will be a father to him, and he will be a son for me, whom I will punish when he does wrong, with a rod of men and with blows of human beings. 15 But my loyal love shall not depart from him as I took it from Saul, whom I removed from before you. 16 Your house and your kingdom shall endure forever before you; your throne shall be established forever.” ’ ”
17 According to all these words and according to all this vision, this Nathan spoke to David.
The word HOUSE is used a lot in this passage. And it continues to be used in the second half of the chapter which is David’s prayer in response to God’s promise. In the whole chapter the word house is used 8 times. With 3 different meanings…
HOUSE:
David’s palace (v 1-2)
Yahweh’s temple (v 5, 6, 7, 13)
David’s dynasty (v 11, 16)
The luxurious quality of David’s palace led him to propose building a fitting temple for Yahweh, but while God declined this proposal, he ironically promised to build for David a dynastic house. (Working Preacher https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-16-2/commentary-on-2-samuel-71-14-3)
So David has a house. (palace)
David wants to build God a house. (temple)
But God wants to build David a house. (dynasty)
David will end up collecting materials for the Temple and his son Solomon will build the Temple. (In other words, David listens to God but he also just can’t let it go. David has decided that God must have a “house” and even though God is building a different kind of house, David remains determined to build the kind of house he had in mind in the first place.)
I really identify with David in this.
We know that David hears what God says through the prophet Nathan, because the ONLY way David uses house in his prayer is speaking about the dynasty God has promised… 18, 19, 25, 26, 27, and 29 (twice).
18 Then King David went and sat before Yahweh and said, “Who am I, my lord Yahweh, and what is my house that you have brought me up to this place? 19 Still, this was insignificant in your eyes, my lord Yahweh, and also you have spoken about the house of your servant from afar, and this may be the teaching of humans, my lord Yahweh.
25 So then, Yahweh God, the word that you have spoken concerning your servant and concerning his house, confirm it forever, and do just as you have promised. 26 Your name shall be great forever, and they will say, ‘Yahweh of hosts is God over Israel’; and the house of your servant David shall be established before you. 27 For you, O Yahweh of hosts, are God of Israel! You have revealed to the ear of your servant, ‘I will build a house for you’; therefore your servant has found courage to pray this prayer to you.
29 Now be pleased to bless the house of your servant, that it may continue forever in your sight; for you, Sovereign Lord, have spoken, and with your blessing the house of your servant will be blessed forever.”
Sometimes, our view of God in the OT is one of a strict, angry, God of judgement. But we see a really beautiful pattern in these stories of God working with the people God has… responding to them, adjusting to what happens, and continuing to be faithful to the promises God makes.
The tribes of Israel wanted a king.
God said, I don’t think you actually want that. That’s not how envisioned this. I want you to be different from all those nations around you. To live in My presence the way I made you to so that eventually all the nations of the world might live in My presence. I will bless you so that I can bless the whole world through you, remember? Abraham and the stars?
Now David really wants a Temple for Yahweh. God needs this. Even if God doesn’t think it’s necessary… I mean, it’s obvious, isn’t it?
But God is interested in building a different kind of house - so yes, eventually Solomon will build Yahweh a Temple - a house.
But God is interested in a different kind of house.
In a people with whom God can live. In a people IN whom God can dwell.
In a dynasty that will bring an entirely different kind of king into the picture. One who will show us what God is like.
And so, eventually, we’ll get to the gospel of Matthew…and how will Matthew begin his gospel?
1 This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham:
So we know that this is where God is where God is heading… to give us Himself. More than a palace. More than a temple. More even than a dynasty.
A revelation of who Yahweh is. Of what God is like. Of what true power and leadership looks like. (Spoiler: it involves laying it all down for the sake of those you love)
What is your house like?
What do you think you need to do for God?
What does God actually want from you?
to live in God’s presence (which is what we were created to do from the very beginning)
How? Well, we remind ourselves every Sunday at the beginning of our service…Micah, - one of those prophets from the margin! - Micah 6:8
8 He has told you, O mortal, what is good,
and what does Yahweh ask from you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?
to receive the blessing of God (which is bigger than “stuff”) - and, like Abraham & Sarah, that blessing is also to flow THROUGH us. Bigger than longings or dreams coming true, it’s God’s presence with us and for us.
to bless God in return - to declare our trust & hope, our dependence on God, to thank and praise God for who God is - which is most clearly revealed to us in the person of Jesus, but we see God’s attritibutes all through the OT as well. And David’s Psalms are full of “blessing God” baruch - and act of adoration, indicates kneeling (humility)
